


Never Enough

by therealspm



Category: Star Trek RPF
Genre: Anal Sex, First Time, M/M, Rimming, Rough Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-15
Updated: 2016-03-15
Packaged: 2018-05-26 19:54:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,659
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6253777
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/therealspm/pseuds/therealspm
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Zach should say no.  But he can't"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Never Enough

Zach is having sex with Chris. No, scratch that, he is fucking Chris. Sex can be a lot of things. It can be tender or hard, fun or serious, awkward, romantic, anonymous, etc. But fucking, that’s very specific.

Fucking is sweat and whiskey, shallow breaths and soft grunts. Fucking leaves behind messes and bruises—and not just in the physical sense. Fucking is what makes your dick hurt the next morning and causes your muscles to ache for days. It is about the sensation, the release—the opportunity to exist for moments without your ego, the momentary escape from the world around you.

Fucking is also what ruins friendships and throws working relationships into awkward territory. It is regret for days, months, years, after. It is, Zach has learned over the years, a bad idea. Especially when the person you are fucking is your slightly egomaniacal, emotionally stunted, commitment-phobic (and let’s not forget eternally straight) co-star and best friend.

Zach tells himself this as he pushes a lubed-up finger into Chris. He tells himself to stop what he’s doing, even as he forces another finger inside, slowly stretching the hole wider. He slides a third finger in and hears his friend moan against the bedspread. He alternately curls and straightens his fingers, lightly brushing up against Chris’s prostate. Zach has sunk too far into the haze of his own arousal to notice the younger man’s increased pleasure.

Pulling his hand away, Zach quickly strokes himself to full hardness before he lines his cock up against the loosened hole. He pauses for just a moment, as if recognizes that to thrust his hips forward would push him—them—past the point of return. He knows that he can still say no. That he can put his clothes back on and ask Chris to leave. He can even go out and find someone else to fuck. Someone less dangerous, someone anonymous, someone he would never have to see again.

But it’s been so long since he felt himself inside another person, since he’s had that release from thought and feeling. And—maybe he’s just imagining it—he hears a note of demand in Chris’s breath. A touch of pleading. A sense of urgency. He stares at the man lying bent over the end of his bed, raking his eyes over the slight-yet-muscled form, the skinny, hairy legs, blue-jeans pooled around the ankles. He should say no.

But he can’t.

Zach twitches his hips ever-so-slightly, and the tip of his cock slides into Chris. He feels Chris tense at the intrusion and he throws his head back with the warring of pain and pleasure caused by it. He waits for Chris to relax before inching himself all the way in, until his pelvis is resting full against the younger man’s ass. It’s a process that seems to take hours, although Zach assumes that the seconds that pass are simply stretching out interminably, as if time itself were grinding to a halt to witness the scene.

He pulls out, not quite all the way, and then thrusts forward again, this time not so slowly. Chris gasps. Zach doesn’t give him time to catch his breath before he repeats the motion. He sets a rhythm with his hips—too fast, he knows, for Chris’s first time—but he can’t make himself move slower. He shifts slightly so that his cock rams into his prostrate with each thrust and knows that Chris will be too lost in that sensation to notice the pain, though he will certainly feel it later.

Neither man speaks a word as Zach continues to thrust forward. The silence is instead filled with moans, grunts, the occasional gasp, and the steady slapping sound of Zach’s balls hitting against Chris’s ass.

Zach reaches a hand around to Chris’s erection as soon as he feels his own orgasm start to build. Smoothing pre-cum over the warm length, he pumps his fist up and down with rough, hurried strokes until he feels Chris spasm around him as warm, sticky liquid coats his hand. He thrusts one last time, forcing himself in as deep as he possibly can while his own orgasm rocks through his limbs.

There it is, that moment of forgetting, the release from reality. In that instant, he feels so good that he allows himself to think—fleetingly—that maybe everything will be alright. He pulls out of Chris and collapses onto the bed, riding out the waves of thoughtlessness as long as he possibly can.

When he comes back to reality, though, Chris has left, the only sign of him the drying semen on the bedspread. He had left without a word.

Oh shit.

***

Zach doesn’t hear from Chris for six days, fifteen hours, and approximately twenty minutes. Not that he’s keeping track.

He fills the time with a host of mundane everyday activities. He takes Noah on walks. He cleans his already immaculate home. He does laundry, running only half-loads so that it will take up a larger chunk of the day. He goes out for coffee, meets friends for lunch, reads a couple of new books, dodges the paparazzi. And he spends every waking moment mentally beating the shit out of himself for the ridiculously stupid mistake he and his penis made.

He feels the emptiness of not having Chris around. A few times he thinks of something, a pun, an exceptional witticism, a new million-dollar word—all things he would normally share with Chris, things only Chris would understand, would appreciate. Once he had his phone out, text half-written before he realized that he couldn’t send it.

After all, he had made the mistake; he had done the fucking. It is Chris’s prerogative whether to call or not. Zach tries to remember if there is some exception, some loophole that would allow him to make the call. But he can never quite reason himself into making the first move. He is afraid, and his fear paralyzes him.

The ball is in Chris’s court.

Six days, fifteen hours, and approximately twenty minutes after Zach came inside his best friend, he opened the door to find Chris sporting a six-pack of beer, several DVD cases, and a surprisingly relaxed grin.

Zach is confused.

It must have shown because the light in Chris’s smile fades slightly, “It’s Saturday movie night, dude.”

“What?”

“Wes Anderson marathon. You promised you’d try watching him again. You can’t judge every film he’s ever made on Rushmore.”

Zach just stares at his friend. Chris sighs, shrugs his shoulders, apparently deciding to ignore the older man’s seeming loss of brain functioning, and pushes past him into the house. He walks briskly into the living room, plops the beer down on the coffee table, collapses onto the futon, and begins to leaf through the DVD cases.

“I figure we should start with Life Aquatic, since it’s by far the funniest and least Wes Andersonny of the movies. You know, ease you into it a little bit. Give you time to appreciate the man’s genius.”

Zach tries to collect himself. I get it, he thinks, we’re playing the it-never-happened game. I can do that. “I make no promises. I don’t get this yuppie obsession with Wes Anderson. Is this some sort of disease you picked up at Berkeley or something?”

Chris flashes him an annoyed look, “It’s not just Berkeley man. Anderson is universal. The fact that you have no appreciation for his work calls into question not only your taste in movies, but your taste in everything in general.”

“This coming from the guy who watched Because I Said So half a dozen times.”

“Hey,” Chris says, visibly offended, “Diane Keaton is a bad-ass.”

The rest of the evening continues along the same vein. The pair slips effortlessly back into their dynamic. They joke, they needle, they banter, they laugh. Zach even tries to enjoy the movies, he really does. After all, he most certainly took advantage of Chris the other night. It’s definitely not something he’s proud of, and he wishes he could take it back. So the fact that his friend is willing to not only forgive, but apparently forget altogether means that the least Zach can do is suffer through a marathon of pithy, overly pretentious, entirely un-amusing, childish films.

Most of the way through the second movie, however, Zach decides that they’re probably even, considering the mental an emotional agony he’s currently enduring. He snatches the remote from Chris’s hand and presses stop. “No more,” he says, simply.

They go through the motions of arguing about it, but it’s clear to both men that Zach is never going to enjoy or understand Wes Anderson. They chat amicably for a while afterwards, until the conversation becomes more and more sparse and they finally fall into silence.

A couple of minutes later and the silence enters painfully awkward territory. The events of last week come flooding back into Zach’s consciousness and before he can stop himself, he blurts, “About last Saturday….”

Chris visibly stiffens, “Dude, don’t.”

“We should probably talk about it.”

“No, we shouldn’t.”

“But—”

“Look,” Chris interrupts, “It…” he darts his tongue out of his mouth and runs it over his lower lip nervously, “It’s no big deal, okay?” His tone implies end-of-discussion and five minutes later he is in his car, driving away.

This time, Zach only worries for two days before Chris shows up again. He fucks the younger man up against the wall.

This time, he knows better than to try and talk about it.

¬¬¬***¬

Zach can never quite get over the fear that Chris won’t come back. That he’s finally pushed too far, said the wrong thing, touched him the wrong way, fucked him too hard, or done one of a million other things that will ultimately end their bizarre friendship once and for all. But Chris always does come back. Even when Zach sends him home with a pattern of bruises across his chest and left butt-cheek and a swollen red bite mark on his dick, a week later Chris is on all fours on his kitchen floor, moaning as Zach dips his tongue in and out of his hole.

It’s as if they have two completely different relationships. One the one hand, they have their you-can-call-it-a-bromance-if-you-want-to friendship. It’s their war over the English language, their challenges to fit ‘anthropomorphic’ or ‘peripatetic’ into everyday conversation. They watch Brat-Pack marathons and bicker about the merits of the newest L.A.-fad microbrew. The relationship is soft, comfortable, and easy. It’s the relationship everyone thinks they have.

On the other hand, they are fuck-buddies, without the buddy part. (The Chris that sucks him off in the shower, fingers wiggling in his ass, is more of a stranger to Zach than anyone he’s ever fucked.) This relationship is about the orgasm and the release. It’s about the bruises. They test the boundaries of what two men can do to each other, and what they can do to themselves.

Zach hates this stranger-Chris that he fucks, almost as much as he despises the needy, demanding, hurtful, not-quite controlled self that leaves bite-marks up and down Chris’s spine. He hates the younger man’s submissiveness even as he craves it. In the heat of the moment, this hate is what makes him thrust harder, deeper, faster, and dig his nails into the soft skin beneath him.

Two-and-a-half years, three-and-a-half doomed romances, and one-and-a-half sequels later, Zach finally says no.

His dick is half-hard hanging out the front of his jeans. Chris is on his knees in front of him, licking his lips, eyes dilated with arousal. Zach looks down and feels such a swelling of disgust that he sways on his feet. He twists his hips sideways and moves to pull his pants up over his waning erection.

“The fuck?” Chris rasps upward at him, grabbing hold of his wrists.

Zach struggles to free his hands.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m stopping this.”

Chris looks hurt, but lets go. He stands up. There is a small, dark spot on his cotton pants where precum has soaked through the layers of fabric. “Why?”

Zach’s not sure, so he doesn’t answer.

“Was I…doing something wrong?” The vulnerability in his voice makes Zach cringe.

“No.”

Chris frowns. He slumps his shoulders, curling up in on himself like he’s trying to become nonexistent. Zach wants this stranger to leave. He wants his Chris instead. He wants the man who will spend a lazy Sunday afternoon reading eccentric Belgian novels to be the one offering him a blowjob. He wants to make love to his friend with the atrocious fashion sense and dependence on five-year-old sweatpants.

Not fuck.

No, he wants tenderness and romance.

He looks at Chris, “I should leave.”

“It’s your house.”

“Oh, right. You should leave then.”

Chris cocks his head sideways and regards Zach with curiosity. “You know, Zachary, refusal of sex is often symptom of a deep-seated neuro-psychological disorder,” he jokes. In that instant, Zach sees just a flash of the Chris he is in love with.

And that’s all it takes. Almost immediately, he is across the room, gripping the back of the younger man’s neck and thrusting his tongue inside his mouth. They kiss, all hunger and need and scraping teeth. Coming up for air, Zach pulls off both of their shirts. He nibbles a line along Chris’s jaw and down his neck and chest. He teases his left nipple softly with his tongue, lathering it up with his saliva before he bites down hard quickly and then letting go.

Reaching his hand down past the waistband of his cotton pants, Zach grabs hold of Chris’s cock while he gives his right nipple the same treatment. Both men are hard in a manner of seconds and they pause to strip down completely naked.

Zach reaches behind Chris and plants one hand firmly on each butt-cheek, jerking him forward so that their hips are pressed together. He begins rotating his own hips so that their cocks are rubbing up against each other and groans with the feeling. He lets go of the other man’s ass and instead grips his hair with one hand, pulling Chris in for another kiss while the other hand wraps around both of their erections.

Continuing the hungry kiss, Zach begins pumping his hand back and forth. He relishes the contrast of sensation created by his rough hand and the softer warmth of Chris’s cock on his own. It doesn’t take long before he feels his orgasm building. Both men come together, squirting semen over their stomachs, thighs, and Zach’s hand.

Chris’s knees buckle with the sensation and he falls down to all fours. He rises to kneeling and begins to lick the cum off of Zach’s body. The older man pushes him away and storms into the nearby bathroom.

In the shower, Zach scrubs himself painfully raw and then punches a hole in the tile wall. When he emerges, knuckles bleeding, Chris is—as he expected—nowhere to be found.

***

Zach spends the next seven months looking for the man he loves in the man he’s fucking. He catches small glimpses every now and again. Chris smiles, the corners of his eyes wrinkling in the familiar way and Zach will falter, losing his thought process and his rhythm. Or while they’re fucking, Chris will use a word too large and too poetic for the context, and Zach will think that his friend is actually there, in the room.

It’s these moments that make the fucking bearable. Zach is able to hold on to a smile, a glance, a word, for weeks at a time. They happen just enough for him to convince himself that his Chris is actually there with him, somewhere deep inside the stranger wrapped around his cock.

Zach manages to convince himself that Chris might actually feel something for him. Why else would he still be coming back after three years? Maybe he’s too scared to admit it; it’s not as if Zach’s the most gentle and loving partner and Chris has seen the proof of that in bruise after bruise. Maybe he’s not actually terminally straight. Maybe he’s just waiting for Zach to make the first move.

Bolstered by his own delusion and the hopeful mania that accompanies it, Zach decides to go for it. That night, Chris shows up at his door. The look on his face and his uncharacteristic silence show that he’s there as a fuck and not a friend. Undeterred, Zach lets him in and offers him a beer.

They exchange a few terse, labored comments about the weather or whatever-the-fuck-it-is-people-talk-about-when-they-don’t-really-want-to-talk-about-anything. Just do it! Zach decides after a few minutes and takes two steps across the kitchen to kiss Chris. They’ve kissed hundreds of times, but this time, the kiss is something different. Zach simply presses his lips up against Chris’s, softly, sweetly. There’s no invading tongue, no scraping teeth, just the barely-there sensation of lip on lip.

Chris tries to deepen the kiss, biting down on Zach’s lip, drawing blood, and trying to force his tongue into the other man’s mouth. Zach pulls pack quickly and frowns. He shakes his head slightly, once, trying to convey what he wants with a look before he once again kisses Chris softly.

The younger man doesn’t get the message, and again tries to harden the kiss with desperation. Zach breaks off and frowns again, “What are you doing?”

“What are you doing?” Chris’s voice holds a hint of anger.

“Kissing you.”

“Yeah, like I’m your fucking boyfriend or something. What’s up with that?”

Three years of frustration rush into Zach’s chest at what Chris says. “What’s up with that? You don’t know? God you’re such an idiot!” he pauses, reconsiders, “No, I’m the idiot. I really am. Three years we’ve been doing this…whatever it is. And I’m so goddamn sick of not knowing. And I’m so sick of pretending like it’s just sex for me. Because it’s not anymore. It never has been. We’re killing each other, slowly, with this whole thing. And it has to stop. But I can never say no to you like this. I need you so much. But I can’t keep hurting you. Because I…I…,” he falters unable to form the next word, finally forcing it out at a slightly higher volume than he intended “I fucking love you.”

Zach can’t look at Chris. His eyes rove over the whole room, settling nowhere, carefully avoiding the body in front of him. Despite his decision to do so, he can’t believe he just said what he did. It’s all out there now, hanging in the room. The silence buzzes in Zach’s ears for minute after interminable minute. He wants—no, needs—something to happen, anything. The suspense is about to give him a fucking heart attack. But he can’t move, it’s up to Chris now. What he says next, what he does in response to Zach’s declaration, is the precarious fulcrum upon which their relationship rests.

Which direction will it go? Zach asks himself.

Chris answers the wordless question by softly gripping Zach’s hand in his own. He runs his other hand up and down the pale palm and long fingers and then lowers his lips slowly downward. The movement draws Zach’s eyes away from their roving journey and the pair make eye contact for a split second before Zach draws his gaze away. Chris’s lips brush against his hand, softly, so quickly that Zach is not quite sure that it actually happened.

Pulling him forward by his still-held hand, Chris leads Zach to the nearby bedroom. Once inside the room, though, Zach freezes in place. The younger man tugs his arm, trying to lead him to the plush king-size bed just feet away, but he is rooted to the spot. Chris pauses, seems to ponder the situation for a few seconds before he moves to stand directly in front of Zach, inches away.

Zach holds his breath, waiting to see what will happen next. Chris grips his face in his warm, surprisingly soft hands. He traces one finger down the side of his face, over his cheekbone, rubbing roughly against the three-day stubble. He combs his fingers through Zach’s hair, and a shiver runs through his body.

Gently, hands still gripping the dark overly-gelled hair, Chris draws Zach’s face toward his—not to kiss, but to force sustained eye contact. Zach lets out a long held breath when he looks into the blue eyes before him and sees his friend. He was expecting to see the stranger-Chris in that face, but when he searches the pattern of lines and scars across the pale skin, he sees only the man he is in love with.

That’s all Zach needs.

They kiss. This time Chris doesn’t try and harden the kiss. Zach sighs against his mouth at the strange and new sensation of softness. He runs his tongue softly against Chris’s bottom lips and smiles as he feels a shiver go up his spine. Zach pulls his lips away in order to remove first his—and then Chris’s—shirt. He delicately grips the younger man’s chin between his thumb and forefinger. Leaning forward, he places a sweet kiss on his forehead, then his nose, followed by each eyelid.

Zach pauses, opens his mouth to say something, but fears that speaking might break the spell and so he remains silent.

Trailing kisses over each others faces, necks, and chests, the two men move slowly toward the bed. The backs of Chris’s legs make contact with the mattress and he loses his balance, falling backward onto the thick, white comforter. Stifling a giggle, Zach takes advantage of his surprise and quickly slips off Chris’s jeans and briefs. He throws them into a pile in the corner of the room, and his own soon follow.

Zach takes a moment to fully absorb the image presented to him. Chris is lying naked and flushed on his bed. His pupils are dilated with the arousal that Zach sees plainly expressed in other parts of his body. His gaze is focused on Zach’s own naked form and he licks his lips in anticipation. Everything about him—from the way that he is sprawled across the duvet to how his tongue only runs across his lower lip, sticking almost all of the way out of his mouth in order to do so—screams that this is Christopher Whitelaw Pine and he wants this.

They make love slowly. Zach kneels at the foot of the bed with Chris’s legs wrapped around his waist, ankles locked and resting on his buttocks. The pace that Zach sets is unhurried, almost languorous. The primal, feral part of him is screaming for him to move faster, pump harder. But he wants this to last, and he knows that if he strays from the lazy rhythm he will lose himself in seconds.

Chris runs his hands over Zach’s body and he gasps with the feeling. He has felt it before, many times, Chris beneath him, around him, soft and pliant, hot hands searching slick skin for a hold. But this—what they are doing now, in this moment—is incredibly new. It is soft and tender and could not by any stretch of the imagination be defined as fucking.

Zach wishes he could live in this moment forever, surrounded by breathless sighs, encased in Chris’s body. Jolts that have nothing to do with sex run through his body and settle in the pit of his stomach. The feeling settles deeper, where it is joined by the heat that the friction between their bodies creates. The heat spread out through his body, slow tendrils of euphoria snaking through his veins. He finds himself lost in the sensation and quickens the pace almost imperceptibly. The change is enough, though, to drive him over the edge into an orgasm that spreads through his veins like molasses, seemingly lasting for days.

When he comes back down to earth, Zach is lying half-on-top of Chris. He pulls himself out gently and rolls over so that he is lying parallel to Chris on the bed. After a moment he realizes that he should probably help the younger man finish, but is surprised to find the sticky evidence of his climax painted across his chest. Instead, then, he opts to lean over Chris’s still form and place a chaste kiss on his dry lips.

Minutes later he falls into unconsciousness.

***

The next morning Zach rouses slowly. He fades in and out of consciousness for a while, gaining awareness of his surroundings little by little. As he makes the journey from sleeping to waking, his sense of satisfaction, of happiness, of rightness grows. A lazy smile spreads across his lips as he reaches over towards the man lying next to him.

But Chris isn’t there.

The last bits of sleep evaporate from his mind and his smile fades. Oh god please don’t tell me it was just a dream, he thinks. The memory feels so raw, so real. He can even recall the taste of Chris’s sweat on his lips, the feeling of encasing the younger man in his arms. He inhales deeply and for a second he can detect a hint of Chris’s aftershave hanging in the air. He’s had some pretty realistic dreams in the past, but this—this sense memory—feels so real that it just can’t be a dream.

Can it?

Zach rakes his eyes over the bedroom looking for any sign that what he remembers exists beyond the confines of his imagination. Not finding any evidence, he begins to panic, his breath coming in short bursts, his vision blurring beyond what is normal without his glasses. Making one last ditch effort, he scans the room again before his eyes come to rest on the proof he needs. The other pillow on his bed—the one next to his own compacted, pomade stained one—has a small indent right in the middle of the otherwise pristine surface. Careful not to disturb his only clue, Zach leans in to examine the indent. The lack of long dark strands and hair grease rule it out as his doing, and the absence of both cat and dog hairs means that neither of his pets snuck into the bedroom overnight. Moving in closer, he takes a whiff and his senses are assaulted with the overwhelmingly distinct scent of Chris: vanilla, cinnamon, and designer deodorant.

Breathing a sigh of relief, Zach lets the smile return to his face and is flooded once again with a feeing of overwhelming happiness. Finally, he thinks, after everything, it finally happened.

Zach actually springs out of bed, barely restraining himself from dancing around the bedroom in a haze of victory and glee. Instead, he takes a few deep, calming breaths and lets the happiness sink in. The fluttering in his chest slows and settles in the low part of his stomach. His limbs feel heavy, and his head light, practically weightless.

Moving slowly in order to avoid getting dizzy, Zach goes through his normal morning routine. He does this mainly because, at this point, he’s not sure what else to do; and if he doesn’t do something quick he’ll spend the rest of the day glued to that spot, entranced in the simple act of remembering every detail of the night before.

Any concern he has for what might have happened to Chris is assuaged by the simple thought that he probably had a damn good reason for leaving (it was late morning after all, maybe he had an audition or an appointment with his agent or something) and would most certainly be in touch whenever he became available.

Consequently, Zach is not surprised when, in the early afternoon, his phone buzzes with a simple text from Chris: Great news. Come over ASAP.

He isn’t sure exactly what news could be so great, after all pretty much anything he considers great happened within the past twenty-four hours, but he’s willing to indulge Chris. He texts back: Okay. Will be there within the hour.

The fifteen-minute wait Zach imposes upon himself in order to build up the suspense becomes painful after only two of those minutes. So he figures five is the new fifteen, grabs his keys and dashes out the door to his car.

Zach notices that a small, flashy, vaguely feminine car is parked in the spot he normally commandeers. Biting back a flash of annoyance—why let some random person ruin his mood on this the-most-glorious-of-days?—he finds a spot a couple yards further down the road.

In a matter of seconds, he is out of his car and standing on Chris’s doorstep, pressing two slightly-shaky fingers into the doorbell. He hears footsteps and the door opens.

Zach is pretty sure he stops breathing.

The reason he stops breathing is standing next to Chris—my Chris, his brain protests feebly—in designer flip flops, brightly manicured fingers intertwined with his.

The girl is Chris’s girlfriend, Carrie. The fact that she’s smiling at him warmly and moving in for a hug means that she has no idea that Chris is about to leave her for Zach.

That is what this is about, isn’t it? Zach wonders. And then realization hits, Oh god, he’s not seriously planning on having me here with him when he does it. That is just so typically Chris. He looks over at the younger man, but his smile betrays nothing. Oh this is bad on so many levels.

Zach is too caught up planning how to kill Chris without ruining his career to resist when the pair pulls him inside to the living room. They sit down together on the couch, hands glued together while Zach settles uneasily in a nearby chair.

Chris turns towards Carrie and smiles, ”Something amazing has happened.” Carrie beams. Well, yeah, Zach thinks, but I don’t think she’d see it that way. “And you really mean a lot to me,” Chris’s gaze is focused on Zach, indicating that he is the ‘you’ in this sentence, “so I wanted to tell you in person before you found out second hand.” Wait what? Zach thinks in the second before both Chris and Carrie fix their gazes on him and practically yell, grinning like clowns, “We’re getting married!”

Zach definitely stops breathing this time.

His head begins to swim and he has a moment to think that this is probably what fainting feels like before he is brought back to the present by Chris’s voice “…might seem kind of sudden, but it just felt right, you know? So I just hit the ground running this morning and asked her to marry me.”

Zach gulps in air, trying to stay on the surface. He will not allow himself to lose consciousness. He will not show weakness. He will not let on that he is affected in any way, shape, or form by this news. He will not allow them to see that his foundations just crumbled to dust. There are a million things that he wants to say right now, starting somewhere along the lines of “What the fuck” and ending with “Didn’t last night change anything? Please tell me it changed something.” But he purses his lips, as if the action will keep these words in and only allows one to escape, “Congratulations.”

“Thank you,” Chris beams. “Also…and I think this goes without saying really but I kind of want to do things right…I wanted to ask you to be my best man.”

He doesn’t remember making the decision to leave. He doesn’t remember if he said or did anything before walking out. He doesn’t remember driving home and unlocking his door. He doesn’t even remember smashing every single available dish in the kitchen in order to satisfy his primal need to destroy something.

In fact, the first thing Zach remembers after hearing Chris’s request is lying on the futon, face wet with tears and knuckles soaked in his own blood. He curls his legs up to his chest and gives in to the sinking hurt reverberating throughout his body.

How could he think that sex—even soft, tender, loving sex—could ever solve anything? Especially since it was fucking that got the whole messed-up business started in the first place. How could one night fix a complete inability to be in a functional relationship? How could he have let himself be happy like that—hope that things could change? How could he think—even for a moment—that anything would work out between them? How could he have been so stupid?

Zach continues to ask himself these—and similar—questions over and over for hours. He falls asleep without answering a single one. He dreams of vanilla, cinnamon, and designer deodorant.

***

Chris and Carrie marry in the fall. Zach performs his best-man duties without betraying a hint of the agony it causes him. It’s actually a beautiful ceremony, and the reception is the party of the century. Chris looks like he’s having the time of his life.

That is, until he surreptitiously pulls Zach into the men’s bathroom. At that point, his face is only fear and self-loathing and incredible, incredible sadness. So Zach sucks him off, careful not to get anything on the groom’s expensive tux.

Minutes later, Zach watches the rest of the wedding party dance the electric slide, a gleeful smile once again plastered across Chris’s face. Zach smiles too, but sadly. The Chris he is watching, the one he loves, belongs to everyone else but him. But the other Chris, the one so full of self-hate, of insecurity, of need, that Chris belongs only to him.

It’s not what he wants, but he’ll take it, because the alternative is no Chris at all. It’s not enough, but it’s something.

**********  
**********

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: The writer is a notoriously insecure creature. If the story is good, she most definitely needs to hear it. If it’s crap, she definitely needs to hear it so she can delete it and pretend she never wrote it. In summary, please comment.


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